Eskandor lay stretched out over the white mantle of snow, his gaze lost in the dull sky, as if searching for something beyond the frozen clouds. There were no more tasks to fulfill. He, along with the other ice giants and the silent skeletons, had already finished surrounding the entire perimeter with the dead, twisted trees. The work was complete. Now, nothing remained but silence... and rest.
But was he tired? No. His monumental body did not know exhaustion, but that didn't mean he couldn't surrender to the pleasure of repose.
"Will His Majesty grant me more of his blood?" he murmured, slowly opening the eyes that had been closed. Two icy blue irises gleamed beneath his heavy eyelids, with a vertical pupil resembling that of an ancient beast. A line of vapor escaped from between his parted lips, condensing in the cold air. In his eyes, there was only greed. Desire. A thirst that could not be quenched.
He sighed—a deep sound, muffled by the snow around him—but something made him frown. He felt cold. A subtle prick, but unmistakable. Real cold. The kind that lightly burned his skin, like ice needles piercing his thick hide.
That didn't make sense.
Eskandor knew well the cold of this realm, the cold born from Uriel's slumber, which never bothered the ice giants—least of all him, a being with draconic blood running through his veins. He never felt cold. Never.
"Why is it cold?" he murmured, lifting his torso slowly. "What is happening...? And what is this feeling I'm sensing?"
He fell silent, eyes wide. It was a strange feeling, fleeting, like a forgotten memory that refuses to surface. Something he had felt before... but where?
Then the sound stopped.
There was no transition, no warning. It simply ceased to exist. The whisper of the wind, the creaking of the dead trees, even the faint tinkling of snowflakes... all vanished. An absolute silence took over, as if the world had stopped breathing.
Ainz, who was walking across the snow-covered land, his empty sockets scanning every shadow in search of more bone serpents or other abominations from the realm of the dead, stopped. He did not feel cold—after all, he was a skeleton—but what he felt was far deeper.
It was a feeling he knew intimately.
Death.
But not ordinary death. This was something ancient, pure, primal. A weight that crushed even those who no longer breathed. Something that seemed to whisper to the bones: "You too can cease to exist."
"It can't be... She is here?" he murmured, his jaw moving slowly, dry teeth clicking against each other. His voice was emotionless, but there was a nearly imperceptible note... fear. The kind of fear not felt by the body, but by the soul. The very essence of death—something even the dead could not ignore.
Uriel, who had been resting in silence, stretched his immense body with a slow, heavy motion. He was about to open his titanic wings to raise a new wall of ice with his [Frostbreath of the Ice Giant Dragon], but he stopped.
His single eye turned to the entrance of the valley. Something was approaching.
Something strong.
Something dangerous.
Something that carried the essence of death in its most absolute form.
Uriel knew it. He had died once before being summoned to this world... and this was the same omen he had felt before his fall.
A silhouette walked through the snow.
It was a woman.
And even before her image became clear, they all knew: she was not ordinary. Her long black hair flowed gently, despite the lack of wind. And even before they saw her eyes, they could feel her gaze—an invisible, oppressive touch that dug deep into the soul.
Everyone froze. Not out of fear, but instinct. As if blinking, breathing, or moving a single muscle would be signing their death sentence. Time itself seemed bent around her, as though even the world feared her.
"I must say... it's not often I see your kind. Rather, I've seen very few in all my long years of life. And believe me, they are many... though I'd rather not speak of them." Hela. The goddess of death. She walked with the elegance of an empress among invisible servants. Each step she took left deep marks not in the snow, but in reality. Even Uriel, with his twelve-meter height and scales as thick as fortress walls, could feel that touch. He felt a tingling in his ears, as if her voice pierced directly into his mind.
Hela stopped before him. Her eyes scanned the colossal body of the dragon with fascination, without the slightest trace of fear. And then, she was already at Uriel's side.
With inhuman delicacy, her fingers—pale as ivory—glided over one of the dark-blue scales of the dragon. She admired every detail like one who beholds a forgotten work of art.
And Uriel... did not move.
He did not even dare to breathe.
"I am honored to receive the Goddess of Death herself..." said Uriel, his deep voice echoing like distant thunder rolling over frozen plains. He kept his head raised, wings folded firmly over his colossal back, trying his best to hide the tension that squeezed his chest like invisible chains. "I hope you're not too offended by me choosing this place as my home."
He did not show fear—he couldn't. He was a dragon, an ancient being. And yet, inside, he felt as though he stood before the very end. Hela, the absolute sovereign of the lands of the dead, was before him. Her gaze pierced him like blades made of silence and doom. What was she doing there? Had she come to claim the territory he had taken? It was hers, after all. This entire realm—the land, the sky, the bones, and the souls—belonged to that woman. Perhaps she didn't like seeing Uriel rise within her domain.
"Offended?" Hela's voice sounded with a treacherous softness, like the whisper of silk being torn. Her eyes, black as the densest night, gleamed with a flash of amusement—though it was also a warning. "I would be, yes, if you keep saying things I don't like."
She stepped even closer, her movements so graceful and light they didn't seem to belong to this world. Her fingers continued exploring Uriel's scales with a mix of curiosity and admiration, as if he were a living sculpture—rare and fascinating.
"For now... I just want to appreciate you."
The phrase lingered in the air like an ambiguous promise.
"Even among the dragons I've known, you are different," Hela continued, her voice now carrying a note of sincere enchantment. She knew Fafnir—the devouring dragon, monstrous and greedy. She knew well what he was—deformed, repulsive, corrupted by his insatiable desire. Uriel, on the other hand, was something else. He had beauty. Not the fragile beauty of mortals, but a wild, rugged, hypnotic majesty. His presence was like a living mountain, made of eternal ice and silent power.
"I like what I'm seeing," she said, and a slow smile formed on her pale, almost ethereal lips. Her eyes now examined him with a feverish intensity, as if he were the key to something she had long desired. "You may not be the strongest, but... you should serve for what I want."
There was a dark light in her gaze, a flame of ancient, merciless purpose. Finally, after so long trapped in that limbo, she glimpsed a way out. Uriel might be the missing piece. The instrument to break the cruel seal Odin had cast upon Hel, preventing her from leaving the world of the dead.
Hela's expression softened for a moment, but the aura around her continued to scream danger. It was like gazing at a mirror-like lake in the dead of night: beautiful, calm... but with unknown, deadly depths.